Muzikahöliks Blog

For the assignment, Maria and Kathleen chose to analyze the website of Ace of Base.

At first glance, the website is somewhat dull; other than the picture and their name, everything is grey and the tabs at the top of the page are almost invisible. Although Ace of Base is not that popular anymore, it's still a very understated layout. This, perhaps, reflects the importance of modesty in Sweden. People are generally overly modest and care a great deal about what others think of them. Kids are taught that it's wrong for them to think of themselves as better than others. Also, Sweden doesn't celebrate its national holiday as much as other countries because the people think they might offend immigrants or that they are not allowed to be proud of their nationality. Still, even for Sweden, the website for Ace of Base is a little too quiet and too ordinary (compare it to the websites of contemporary Swedish artists: www.laleh.se, www.petter.nu, www.thearkworld.com). The one thing that grabs your attention, though, is the pictures; because the text is so bland, the stark contrast makes the pictures jump out even more. Maybe because they're an older group they don't feel the need to have such a flashy website. The pictures show that they're still cool and hip, but the modesty shows that they're still classy and not a washed-up, attention-seeking old group that used to be famous in the early 90s.

We would argue that the website is culturally specific because a Swedish audience and an American audience would interpret it differently. To an American audience, the website would easily be overlooked because it is so monotone; it also doesn’t play samples of their songs like many artists’ websites do. However, a Swedish audience would interpret it in a more positive way because Ace of Base is remembered as one of the few Swedish groups that reached international fame. Furthermore, the website embodies the idea of “less is more,” a concept that the Swedish prize more than Americans (compare Stanford’s website to Örebro’s website).

Posted by Kathleen Ryou at 10:40 AM | Permalink | Comments (5)

For our rhetorical text, Johan, Karl-Johan, and I chose to analyze Microsoft's main webpage (http://www.microsoft.com/en/us/default.aspx). As a behemoth, multi-national company, Microsoft both needs to exert its authority through its website and face a wide range of audiences, from the home users in the US to corporate customers in Tokyo. Thus, we thought that this would be a interesting source to analyze to see what rhetorical strategies Microsoft has decided to use.

The first aspect of the site that immediately pops into our minds is the use of colors. The site uses orange, and various shades of blue -- an unconventional mix. Johan and Karl-Johan commented on it bringing a "fresh impression" to the audience and the calming effect it has. I feel that this is a rhetorical strategy to strengthen Microsoft's ethos as well as affect the viewer's pathos. By calming the audience, the site seems almost more friendly to its users.

One of the most prominant features of the site is its advertisement image for Office 2007, the company's newest product. Using the contrast of colors, the ad immediately catches the audience's attention. While my Swedish couterparts commented on the ads about its persuasive power (they said they would go buy the product), I personally did not find it as appealing. Using an image advertisement for a software product, it almost felt too cliche -- who needs another version of Microsoft Office? I attribute this to my desensitization to web-based adaversiements. Ironically, they're looking at the US version of Microsoft's website.

In addition, the website contains a rich amount of information. There are many links and a lot of short text descriptions. Although all the information can seem overwhelming at times, Microsoft successfully conveys its message: "We're big, we are complex, and we have the information you want." Moreover, from a web-design perspective, the site contains dynamic elements such as drop down menus and fancy AJAX tabs, backing the company's claim as the top software producer in the world.

If we could summarize Microsoft's front page with one word, it would be "professional". Obviously, the company's efforts to convey its strong ethos has worked. With audiences ranging from the casual software user to corporate decision maker, the design deals very well with both ends of the spectrum.

On the other hand, the website do not have much content that will cause it to appeal more to one culture than another. It is probably important that Microsoft preserves this "cultural-neutrality" as its scope is one that truly spans the globe.

The Microsoft Sweden site presents a somewhat different view. It is clear from the design that the site focus on three distinct audiences. In the center of the page is an ad for music fans. While on the right, one ad caters to those with a business intention while the other features a game for youth and gamers. The asthetic feelings produced by the colors on the US site is largely missing from the Swedish one. Why is there this difference for the two countries?

Posted by David Yu at 09:13 AM | Permalink | Comments (7)

I. What did Anja and Doreen analyze?

We looked at 4 different examples of websites from MTV and analyzed their social and cultural appeal. The websites we analyzed come from 4 different television channels, which are as follows:

A. MTV: An American television network based in New York City.

B. MTV Sweden: A television channel broadcasting to the Swedish market.

C. MTV K: An American channel, broadcasting in America, dedicated to Korean Americans. It showcases the best of Korean culture while providing a platform for Korean American talent.

D. MTV TRES: An American channel, broadcasting in America, dedicated to Latin Americans. It is rooted in the fusion of Latin and American music, cultures, and languages.

[Note: Both MTV K, and MTV TRES are considered "sister channels" to the main MTV channel in America. There are a few others, including MTV DESI (South Asian-American), and MTV CHI (Chinese-American). There are links to these sites on the MTV.COM websites.]

II. American MTV Website
http://www.mtv.com/

1. How is this site unique compared to the others?
MTV.COM is the busiest site out of the four we looked at. We both found this site to be crowded, a bit confusing, and difficult to navigate because there are so many different sections. In a way, this relates to MTV as a television channel, because it is a channel with such a wide variety of shows. MTV is more than just a music video channel, it is also filled with shows of all types, from car-fixing shows (Pimp My Ride), to reality shows (Real World).
Compared to the other sites, MTV.COM has a lot more pictures on display than words. The pictures are all linked, so that a website visitor does not have to navigate through the toolbars in order to get to a certain website. Writing is definitely kept at a minimum, such as used in short sentences that tag pictures. When there is a lot of written information that needs to be presented (such as descriptions about characters from a show), these descriptions are not presented all at once, but in short blurbs in different sections. There is never one page with a lot of writing on it, which probably is effective at appealing to teens who are too lazy to read material.

2. How does this website distinctly showcase American pop culture?

Looking at MTV.COM, we notice that the website wants to establish how MTV is more than just an entertainment channel. On the homepage, they list top stories such as “Britney Spears’ shaved head”, “Myspace isn’t responsible for alleged assault”, and “Are we going to war with Iraq?”. With Britney Spears [pictured above], we see that Americans are fascinated with the lives of celebrities, especially when they do bizarre things. The latter two stories have nothing to do with America’s fascination with pop culture, but they are topics that affect young people in America. This aspect of MTV.COM makes the point that MTV is a source of educating teens about “world news”, since many teens in America may not always be as interested in watching actual news channels.

A big aspect of the MTV.COM site, compared to the others, is that it has more of an emphasis on style. The emphasis is not just on clothes, and fashion, but also electronics such as fancy hand held cell phones with keyboards. Also unique to this website is the abundance of advertisements that pop up on almost every single page. A few examples of these ads are for cars (Toyota), phone plans (Sprint), movies, and food (McDonald’s Snack Wrap [pictured above]). This reveals how effective ads must be in persuading American teens, and it also reveals the materialistic aspect of Americans, how there is a perpetual need to always get the latest cell phone models, or want to save the most money (such as through cheaper cell phone plans, or cheap fast food).

III. Swedish MTV Website http://www.mtv.se/overdrive.php

1. How is this site unique compared to the others?
Compared to the American site, MTV.SE has a much bigger video screen on the home page, where the website visitor can hear music-related news. The language spoken by the MTV news anchor is Swedish, and the rest of the website is also written in Swedish.
The site has a lot less information compared to the American site. Some examples are, that there are no links to watch movie trailers. On the other hand, there are a few options that you can’t find on the American version, such as competitions, a tabloid of MTV’s TV-shows, and a link to a music shop. It seems like this site has more of a direct focus on the entertainment (music and shows) aspect of MTV, rather than the emphasis on world news and style of MTV.COM.

2. How does this website distinctly showcase Swedish pop culture?
This site focuses a lot on Swedish celebrities, though it also includes American celebrities as well. This site may not appeal to people outside of Sweden because the many Swedish celebrities are not known around the world. The pictures on the home page are of Swedish celebrities who are not as widely known around the world. Even though many of the shows listed on MTV.SE are the exact same shows broadcasted on American channels, there are a few unique Swedish shows as well. This also makes MTV.SE appealing to the Swedish audience, but most people around the world would not be familiar with these shows, since the channel is only broadcasted in Sweden.
3. How is this site similar to the American site?

Since MTV is an American based channel, it is not surprising to see American artists such as Aerosmith [pictured above] shown on MTV.SE. Both these sites appeal to the young adult audience because those are the people who would be most interested in these current music artists and celebrities. These sites allow everyone to be able to catch up on news about celebrities, watch photos of celebrities, as well as find out about new games and movies. They are also appealing to an audience that is familiar with technology and knowing how to switch to “video mode” in order to watch videos, or knowing to turn them off.

IV. Korean-American Focused Website http://www.mtvk.com/

1. How is this site unique compared to the others?

The picture above is MTVK's homepage emphasis, with the title: “North Korea Agrees To Give Up Nuclear Weapons”. This news fact is interesting because this picture is not exactly one that is appealing to a young, teenage audience. Instead, the purpose of this topic is to reassure the American audience about the new positive relationship between North Korea and the United States.

2. How does this website appeal to the Korean-American audience?

Even though the MTV K channel is broadcasted in English, and the website is written in English, mostly Korean artists and celebrities are featured on the site. The picture above is subtitled: “Burning Tree Project discuss the influence of faith upon their music”. One aspect of Korean music that MTVK.COM focuses on, which the other sites do not, is modern Christian music (Christian rock or pop). This is an important part of culture in Korea (and therefore, for Korean-Americans), because the impact of Christianity on the Korean culture has been considerable, in which there has been a steady decline in the membership and influence of traditional religions: Buddhism, Shamanism and Confucianism.

V. Latin-American focused Website http://www.mtv.com/mtvsites/mtvtr3s/

1. How is this site unique compared to the others?
MTVTRES.COM Is visually appealing. Pages on the site are colorful, with the use of the “sun” as a symbol for Latino music. This site contains the least information, in comparison with to the other sites. The two points of focus are on Latino music artists, and Latino dancers, but there is not any aspect of “world news” like the other sites.

2. How does this website appeal to the Latin-American audience?

This website appeals to an audience that is familiar with Latino artists. The very well-known ones in America that are shown on this site are Ricky Martin [pictured above] and Shakira, but this site also emphasizes artists that are not so mainstream in America, that Latin-Americans are aware of. One critique of this channel is that although it was advertised as bilingual, the programming is predominantly English. The official site is run in English with the exception of random Spanish words inserted into sentences.

Posted by Doreen Hoang at 05:06 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)